Bacolor, Ching, de Leon, Olazo, Sison, Valdizno — They Speak To You By Association

Galleria Duemila presents

They Speak To You

By Association Felix Bacolor Mariano Ching RM de Leon Jonathan Olazo Yasmin Sison Trek Valdizno August 6 to 29, 2016 Art Director

Silvana Ancellotti-Diaz

Exhibition Team Mark Arvin Patiag Anna Rafanan Thess Ponce Bing Francisco Mayet Taluban Roy Abrenica Ulysis Francisco Edgar Bautista Roger Ocado Jose Jeoffrey Baba Text

Lisa Ito

Graphic Design

Anna Rafanan

Copyright 2016 Galleria Duemila, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system transmitted in any form or by any means without the written consent of the above mentioned copyright holders, with the exception of reasonably brief excerpts and quotations used in articles, critical essays or research.

Converging Contemporaries Lisa Ito

T

brings together works by select Filipino artists working in painting, printmaking, mixed media and installation, casting a compact arc of contemporary expressions. his annual group exhibition

This year’s show features works by Felix Bacolor, Mariano Ching, RM de Leon, Jonathan Olazo, Yasmin Sison, and Trek Valdizno. Organised by de Leon, the show is a meeting of different art practices all connected by common affinities: unusual juxtapositions and configurations of forms, a certain sensitivity to scale, or the element of surprise or whimsy for instance.

Named after one of the paintings in the show, They Speak To You By Association alludes to how art makes possible a multiplicity of interpretations, connotations and explanations, continually susceptible to being referred to or associated with something else beyond itself. The individual works diverge in terms of directions and exploration, yet it is precisely this same state of unevenness that allows for a certain sense of playful yet productive tension, to take place within the exhibition.

De Leon harness the figurative nature of illustration, for instance, in a series of acrylic on paper works titled The Simplest Things Can Be The Most Difficult Task. Each work depicts an illustration of a hand offering small, simple bouquets, surrounded by a field of pure color: yellow, a color that simultaneously evokes elation and also caution. The optimistic soberness of de Leon’s work can be contrasted with Felix Bacolor’s sets of installation pieces, which as a humorous nod to the anxiety of present socio-political shifts. This balance

between explorative play and formality is also seen in Ching’s mixed media contributions exploring the use of assemblage and silkscreen on black iron as a ground.

The seemingly polar natures of figuration and abstraction, on the other hand, are diffused and seamlessly merged within the exhibition. Yasmin Sison, for instance, offers The Still Room, an oil and encaustic work from her distinct series of figurative images, partially obscured by flat fields of color. Jonathan Olazo and Trek Valdizno, on the other hand, demonstrate the wide expressive possibilities of abstraction in two divergent ways.

Valdizno’s massive foray into gestural abstraction offers a view of the power at work in the ghostly gestures of the hand, scaled to extraordinary proportions. On the other hand, Olazo’s series of abstractions centre on the aesthetics of scribbled and textural forms.

Whether encountered by the viewer as a formal or symbolic experience, the artworks in the show offer a glimpse of converging contemporary conditions. In this tension between abstraction and figuration, play and form, the exhibition underscores the connotative power and fluidity of both material and image. •

LISA ITO IS A WRITER, ARTIST AND ACTIVIST. SHE GRADUATED FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS IN DILIMAN WITH A MAJOR IN ART HISTORY AND HAS PURSUED THE PRACTICE OF ART WRITING SINCE 2001.

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Index 1

COP-17680 Yasmin Sison The Still Room Oil and encaustic on canvas 150 × 101 cm / 59.10 × 39.99 in 2016

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COP-17707 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 2 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17682 Mariano Ching Doorman’s Dream Series Silkscreen on black iron 122 × 122 cm / 48.07 × 48.07 in 2010

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COP-17708 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 3 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17681 Mariano Ching Doorman’s Dream Series Silkscreen on black iron 122 × 122 cm / 48.07 × 48.07 in 2010

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COP-17712 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 7 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COS-17683 Mariano Ching Hippity Hop Mixed media 30 × 25 cm / 11.82 × 9.85 in 2016

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COP-17713 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 8 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COP-17698 Trek Valdizno Spooky Actions 1 Acrylic on canvas 290 × 180 cm / 114.26 × 70.92 in 2016

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COP-17714 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 9 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COP-17699 Trek Valdizno Spooky Actions 2 Acrylic on canvas 290 × 180 cm / 114.26 × 70.92 in 2016

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COP-17715 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 10 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COP-17706 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 1 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17716 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 11 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COP-17717 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 12 Acrylic on paper 110 × 79 cm / 43.34 × 31.13 in 2016

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COP-17718 Jonathan Olazo H-Matrix Acrylic on canvas, burlap on wood 204.50 × 193.5 cm / 80.38 × 76.24 in 2016

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COP-17709 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 4 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17702 Jonathan Olazo Helmet Acrylic and lacquer on canvas 137.50 × 171.50 cm / 54.18 × 67.57 in 2016

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COP-17710 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 5 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17703 Jonathan Olazo They Speak to you by Association Acrylic and lacquer on canvas 171.50 × 137.50 cm / 67.57 × 54.18 in 2016

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C O P - 1 7 7 11 RM de Leon The simplest things can be the most difficult task 6 Acrylic and pen on paper 27.00 × 20.30 cm / 10.64 × 8.00 in 2016

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COP-17704 Jonathan Olazo Gladiator Helmet Acrylic and lacquer on canvas 137.50 × 171.50 cm / 54.18 × 67.57 in 2016

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COS-17720 Felix Bacolor Fountain 2 Manequin Variable dimensions 2016

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COS-17719 Felix Bacolor Fountain 1 Pig head sculpture, bricks, plant, monoblock chair Variable dimensions 2016

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COP-17705 Jonathan Olazo Salt of the Earth Acrylic on canvas, burlap on wood 122 × 194 cm / 48.07 × 76.44 in 2016

About the artists f e l i x b a c o l o r ’s

artistic practice combines a playful dynamic in production and investigation in art-making through a variety of thoroughly researched interests and media such as video, installation and sculpture. Over the years Bacolor mastered the production of object prototypes for his sculpture studies. All this enabled him to experiment rich possibilities in collecting and repurposing objects, and in working with digitized and tangible prototypes in manufacturing. Bacolor studied Studio Arts (Painting) at University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City. Among numerous solo and group exhibitions in the Philippines, his work has also been exhibited in the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Manila; Osage Gallery, Hong Kong; Equator Art Projects and Valentine Willie Fine Art, Malaysia.

Having been trained as an illustrator and photographer, m a r i a n o c h i n g ’s work bellies a sophisticated spatial awareness. His references are largely attributed a surplus of his imagination and are bolsters a childlike receptivity, which comes with an underlying psychedelia pushed forward by his various paradoxical leitmotifs such as voodoo or colonial iconography. An accomplish artist he is a recipient of the Monbusho Japanese Grant and Cultural Center of the Philippines’ 13 Artists Award. His works have been exhibited in France, Malaysia, Singapore and the United States. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts (major in Painting) at the University of the Philippines. Some of his works belong have been acquired by prestigious art collections including that of the Singapore Art Museum.

Revitalizing or making an image from found images is key to r m d e l e o n ’s practice—from the kitsch and cartoonish, or at times the banal, he interweaves them together, deconstructing or obliterating to the effect of abstracting the recognizable. Though the accumulated process of omitting or reanimating elements to aesthetic balance is certainly not a minimal task, his outputs are painstakingly sparse and comes with a certain sensitivity. He incorporates these fragmented elements with exquisite painterly acts—the result is a hybrid of images that bestride representation and abstraction, painting and graphic design, products that seemingly embody the contemporariness and ambiguity of the insurmountable surge of images in today’s technological apocalypse. De Leon completed a bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts

from the University of the Philippines in 1984. He was a recipient of the Cultural Center of the Philippines Thirteen Artists Awards in 1990. An accomplished artist he has received numerous accolades and grants such as Vermont Studio Center (USA) scholarship for studio arts program for painting. He is currently an art professor at the De La Salle-College of St. Benilde. j o n at h a n o l a z o ’s

work manipulate and merge an array of materials and formats such as oil and acrylic on canvas, assembled objects in wood, aluminum, ready-made industrial materials, and photography related media. Olazo’s recent outputs pushes forward through and attempts to preserve William C. Seitz’s 1961 commentary on assemblage as, “all forms of composite art and modes of juxtaposition.” The artist situates his work to a rich possibility of dialogue between the bespoke and the readymade, painting and sculpture, and between the act of painting and the reproducibility of images. Jonathan Olazo completed a BFA Painting degree from the College of Fine Arts at University of the Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City, in 1992 and was a recipient of Cultural Center of the Philippines’ Thirteen Artists Award in 1994. incorporates pop art and figurative elements in her oeuvre; she is also well-known for her sensitive and unwavering children portraits, which offers a panoptic view of the subjects shifting emotional, physical, and psychological transitions. An accomplished artist, Sison holds a degree in Bachelor of Fine Arts, Major in Painting in UP Diliman. She was a recipient of a 13 Artists Awards in 2006 and was shortlisted for the Ateneo Art Awards in 2007. ya s m i n s i s o n

wields unconventional painting tools to achieve gestural abstraction, which is brought by his distinct process; mobilized with urgency; and mostly resulting in layers of quaintly overlapped biomorphic figures. Pluralistic and athletic, the works take the onlooker on a frantic gestural joyride. His work quintessentially showcase, in every sense of the word, a excess of painterly acts as it is not a secret that his acrylics can prance, skate, rollover, crochet, coil, collide, and coagulate. He completed a BFA Painting degree from the College of Fine Arts at University of the Philippines in Diliman. His work has been exhibited in Ayala Museum, Vargas Museum, and Cultral Center of the Philippines. • t r e k va l d i z n o

g a l l e r i a d u e m i l a was established in 1975 by Italian born Silvana

Ancellotti-Diaz. Duemila means “twentieth century”, and it was this vision that inspired Duemila’s advocacy in promoting and preserving Philippine contemporary art. To date, it is the longest running commercial art gallery in the Philippines maintaining a strong international profile. With the vision to expose its artists locally and within the ASEAN region, Duemila complements its exhibits with performances, readings and musical events in its custom-built gallery in Pasay City, Manila.

Galleria Duemila takes pride in being the only local gallery to publish and mount retrospectives of artists as part of its advocacy in pursuing art historical research and scholarship. With the collaboration of institutions, Duemila has mounted the retrospectives of Roberto M.A. Robles (Ateneo Art Gallery, 2011), Duddley Diaz (Vargas Museum, 2009), Julie Lluch Dalena (Cultural Center of the Philippines, 2008). It has also published a book on Diosdado Magno Lorenzo (National Library of the Philippines, 2009) and produced a major Pacita Abad exhibition at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, 2004.

The gallery maintains close ties with museums throughout Asia, Australia, Europe, and the United States. Its futurist vision keeps it at the cutting-edge of Philippine art, making and archiving history as it happens.

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